Winter Encounter

­............

knowing these things, who would not look to his weaponry,

temper himself for survival,

or live like a knife blade, returning one wound for another?

~ Pablo Neruda

­............

The man cowering in the snow is 28, maybe 30, with dark brown hair and sparkling blue eyes that no doubt dazzles a wife back home. Sebastian wonders if he is as cold-hearted as his companions or if he just happened to have stumbled in with the wrong crowd tonight. This sobbing mess doesn't have the face of a murderer.

The wound on his leg will not kill him. It will most likely heal with a doctor's aid and a few stitches, but it prevents him from running any further than this dark alley in the wrong part of town. He cowers in the snow, in his blood and the stench of the urine soiling his fashionable slacks. He gabbles barely discernible pleas between the tears, the begging, the promises of wealth or "anything you want" if they'll just let him go.

But it's not Sebastian's job to be sympathetic.

Ciel leans against the dirty alley wall with two eyes open. One blue eye, the human one, watches the exchange unfazed by a man more than twice his age begging a boy for his life. A year ago, Ciel would have been content to see this man, this observer, walk free. A year ago it would be enough to hurt him, frighten him, teach him not to be caught in the same crime twice for fear of crossing Phantomhive. Sebastian wonders when his master began to change.

Ciel is being particularly harsh tonight; and though Sebastian would once delight in his small master's rare displays of fierceness, he misses the despair, the helplessness, the childish emotions that prompted him to lash out.

In the faint gaslight reflected off the snow Sebastian observes that Ciel's left eye is as blank as the one bearing the contract. Those empty eyes give him no delight.

"Wring out as much information as you can. Dispose of him afterwards." The man's wails rise. Ciel pushes himself off the wall and takes slow steps back into the street. "I'll check for survivors." His high heeled shoes clack audibly against the stones. Sebastian dips his head, raises his eyes and watches him go; Ciel Phantomhive, the little executioner, still cannot watch the axe fall.

"I don't know anything," the man behind him cries. Sebastian waits until he can no longer hear footsteps before he flicks his wrist and the cries go silent. He knows as well as Ciel that this man obviously has nothing to tell. It is a poorly made excuse, but an excuse nonetheless. This at least is a comfort.

Sebastian stares down the empty alleyway and wonders if he should accompany his master to the bloody altar where there will be no survivors. There will be no traces of the child's name, his origin, or any indication of who sold him. There will be no more demons and no more contracts. Just a ceremony gone wrong.

Sebastian wonders if his master is perhaps tired of waiting at home, tired of waiting for his executioner to arrive. His master walks the knife's edge less carefully these days and one morning he'll wake up no different than the ones he seeks.

Lifting the heavy body that is as spineless in his death as his personality was in life Sebastian reflects on Ciel's merciless eyes and recalls Lord Randall's euphemism for the Phantonhives. He wonders who the demons are tonight.